Forensic Science Service

Debate between Andrew Miller and Lyn Brown

Monday 27th February 2012 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Miller (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)]

On behalf of the Science and Technology Committee, it is my pleasure to open the first debate we have held in the Chamber in this Parliament. Our report on the Forensic Science Service was published in June last year. It was prompted by the Government’s decision to wind down the FSS and the ensuing concerns from the forensic science community and, indeed, Members across the House. Before going any further, I would like to thank the outgoing members of the Committee—motion 4 on today’s Order Paper identifies their replacements, who are welcome—for their contribution to the report and the work of the Committee. I would also like to put on the record my thanks to our scientific specialists and the Clerks for their sterling work.

I point out to the Minister that the report was unanimous, with all Committee members being dissatisfied with not only the situation we found ourselves investigating, but the Government’s response to it. To ensure the House understands the history of the situation, a few dates are relevant, and it goes back rather a long way. In 1991 the FSS became an Executive agency of the Home Office. In 1999 it gained trading fund status. In 2002 it stopped being the preferred supplier of forensic services for the Association of Chief Police Officers. In 2003 a Home Office review recommended that it become a public-private partnership via a government-owned company, a GovCo. The transition to a PPP was never completed. In 2005 the FSS changed from a trading fund to a GovCo. By March 2011, as part of a transformation programme, three FSS sites had been closed. On 14 December 2010 the Home Office announced that the FSS would be wound down and that there would be

“no continuing state interest in a forensics provider by March 2012”.

[Lyn Brown (West Ham) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that that is very worrying and could lead to future miscarriages of justice?

[Andrew Miller]

I will go through the Committee’s case—hopefully reasonably forensically—but one of the concerns we express is our worry that this could lead, in the worst cases, to miscarriages of justice. At the time the Government made their announcement, the FSS’s operating losses were claimed to be about £2 million a month and the projected shrinking of forensic markets was cited as the reason for the decision.